


with all the blood (i lost with you)

by ofwickedlight



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Angst, Bittersweet Ending, Blood, Canon - Book, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Study, Death, F/M, Gift Fic, Grief/Mourning, Heavy Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Non-Linear Narrative, Oathkeepers Secret Santa, POV Brienne of Tarth, POV Jaime Lannister, Post - A Dance With Dragons, Post-Canon, Tissue Warning, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-22
Updated: 2019-12-22
Packaged: 2021-02-26 20:00:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21904348
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ofwickedlight/pseuds/ofwickedlight
Summary: All knights must bleed, Ser Arthur had said. Bloodshed was their binds. Their bond. The seal of their devotion.And no one bled more than them.
Relationships: Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth
Comments: 54
Kudos: 125
Collections: Oathkeepers Secret Santa 2019





	with all the blood (i lost with you)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [trulily](https://archiveofourown.org/users/trulily/gifts).



> For the lovely trulily, who was my match for the Jaime/Brienne Secret Santa Exchange. I do hope you enjoy this angst, dear!
> 
> I also want to thank SigilBroken, glamaphonic, and janie_tangerine for being my beta readers! ❤️❤️❤️

* * *

She was even uglier in red.

The color was merciless. Firelight swarmed her in reddish gold, but the sallowness of her skin seeped it up, soiled it, made her flesh glow piss-yellow. The thin, dingy straws that grew from her scalp lay sprawled over his Lannister cloak, the contrast of its beige dullness on silken crimson making his stomach twist.

And the _blood._ It was all dried, old, done, but somehow it drenched her, crusting over her freckles and scars like little red plagues. Hideous, all of it, but Jaime did not look away. The sight was better than focusing on her ragged breaths, the stench of pus and rot and copper, the salted warmth of her fevered sweat oozing through their entwined fingers. The coldness of her skin. The clamminess.

The hole in her belly.

“Your dear Kyle would still wed you, wench,” Jaime murmured. “Even as you grow uglier.” He gave her a soft grin. He’d been soft for some time now—soft eyes, soft voice, soft hand. Never soft words, though. Soft words were only meant for the dying.

But it was his cruelties that had brought her here. So he had tamed his insults, dulled their sharpness to where they were just enough to upset her, just enough to make her rise, make her open her blue eyes and purify the red that swallowed them, leap out of her sickbed, brandish Oathkeeper, and slash his face to ribbons, skewer his bowels, give him wounds to twin hers—every single one she had taken since he sent her away. He had done this to her, done all of it, and Lannisters paid their debts.

Jaime waited. Silence answered him, as it always did. Now, she was even more quiet than before. No. Those rasping breaths were far louder than anything he'd ever heard.

“He is a coward,” Jaime told her. “He fears for his own sake, should he lose you. He knows he’s nothing without you.” Jaime waited again, watched her cream-colored eyelashes like a lion on a hunt. They did not flutter. Did not show a hint of the oceans that lay beyond them.

Her hideous face distorted in a wet blur.

“Wake, and remind him of this.” Jaime’s voice was breaking, choked... or perhaps that was young Podrick outside, sobbing. Perhaps he had not said the faint words at all. The world was so far away, drifting. “Tell him you owe him nothing, that you never did. Tell him to rot in all the Seven Hells. _Tell him_ , Brienne.”

She told him nothing. Ragged breaths. Blooms of crimson, streaming through every dry, dying sigh.

Jaime looked away. Looked out his mind, the Isle, the window, the world, setting golden sun, burning scarlet skies. Red. Red like everything else, and she was still bleeding, and he had not bled enough.

**…**

The copper and rot were in her, now. Lilting on her tongue, metal and sharp and stenched, and the holes in her mouth ached, and pulsed, and bled.

The rot wasn’t a taste, though. It was a smell, wafting from the withered stump, blackened and weeping crimson. Copper. More copper, hordes of it, all around them, and Brienne did not know if it was the wounds from her missing teeth she tasted, or the bloodied air drowned by Ser Jaime’s severed wrist.

He said nothing, the Kingslayer. Stiff in the mud, trembling, jagged breaths hushed and bubbling through the glistening bile that soiled his mouth, the silver tears that had settled there. _Hear me roar,_ his words said, but they had silenced him. He had become more wounded kitten than lion, his laughs and threats twisted into nothing more than agonized mewls.

He was not just silenced, now. He was declawed. Humbled. Faded.

Ended.

But not dead.

Brienne eyed the camp beyond them, their lone shared willow, their rusted chains. Laughing, shouts, sharpening steel, but no incoming footsteps. They could not come for her, now; Jaime had ensured that, when he lied.

Brienne crawled over to where he lay, shaking, bleeding, bleeding everywhere. Her hands pressed into the soft soil, the red wetness where the earth drank from him. She saw his unseeing eyes. Darting, wild, but dull, so dull, tarnished emeralds, clouded. They rolled until they met her gaze, but he couldn’t keep them open. What strength remained had been used to smile at their captors, bare his fangs, scream his last roar, _sapphires._

They had beat him for it. Beat him like madness, demons feasting on a dying lion, and his wound reopened, and blood gushed from his wrist, and he had wailed and whimpered all at once, and she sat there, did nothing but clench her fists, close her eyes, feel her heart thrash in her chest. _Let them have the meat,_ he’d told her, before he had decided to lie, _and you go away._ She had not gone away, though. She had forced herself to listen, and remember.

As Brienne watched those rainy green irises darken, stare into nothing, she wondered if he were away, now. Wondered if he knew what she was about to do, what she had been doing since the arakh rained down, and his screams rang throughout the world.

Her hands found the hem of her tunic. Tore, softly, slow, for if they heard it, knew she meant to foil their cruelties, it would be the end for her, sapphires be damned. Still, her chains rattled, and her breath shook. _Let them have the meat,_ he had said, but they had both given enough of themselves for the Mummers to feast for a lifetime. No more.

The strip of cloth was dirtied with sweat, but it was better than the mud and insects that smothered him now. She reached for him, brushed her fingers against his ruined arm—

He flinched, bared bloodied teeth, and his throat rumbled with a growl that died before it rose, faltered to a groan. His offhand closed halfway before his muscles gave out, and his fist was left unfinished. Still fighting, but feeble, weak, not the menacing aura he was trying so hard to reclaim.

“It’s me, Ser,” she said softly, as soothing as her rough voice would allow. “It’s… it’s the wen—” No. He knew her name, just as she knew his. “It’s Brienne.”

That seemed to calm him. His breath slowed, the tenseness of his frame falling from pained alertness to just _pain_. Gods.

Her fingers encircled his wrist. He shuddered, and she pulled back, apology on her lips. She was not made for such work. Her hands were massive, brutish, strong, not gentle, not caring, only to wield swords, not this, never this. But there was only her. So she reached for him again, just barely grazing, a brush of a feather, trying, _trying_. He let out the smallest whimper, but didn’t fight her.

Brienne was not made for such work. She was not, and with each clumsy twist her manly hands made of the makeshift bandage, the more Septa Roelle sneered in her memories, scolding her.

She did not stop, though. Kept wrapping until the blood was kissed by cloth, and the red weeping was pillowed, and her hideous hands were free.

Through filthy bloodied curls, green eyes watched her. Brienne met his gaze. Dazed, still. Vacant. Perhaps he thought he was dreaming. Perhaps this was a dream, one they both breathed through Riverland wind in a quiet night, and they would wake with different chains between them, different loyalties and shared hatred, but whole bodies, and whole minds, and _whole._

Brienne was still bleeding. Metal. Copper. Copper on her tongue, in her air, and Jaime was still bleeding, too. Bled out again, because they meant to rape her, and he had not allowed it. Had lied. _Sapphires._

His remaining hand was there. Long, elegant, slender. Far smaller and prettier than hers could ever be, and not sticky with blood.

Brienne clasped her palms over his whole wrist, brushed her thumbs against his. The fever had set him ablaze, but somehow, he was cold, too, underneath. A battle of sun and winter, death and life, all within his flesh, and it was a strange thing to feel, terrifying, but Brienne did not let go. Would not.

“You will not die, Ser,” she told him, and wondered if she was the liar, now.

**…**

“I’ve been thinking of Ser Arthur Dayne,” he told her.

The wench raised her head from the cloak she cowered in. She’d been bundled up in the thing since they’d left, gloved hands clutching it close to her massive frame as if she could hide in it, huge chin lowered, eyes melancholy and fixed on the ground.

Those eyes blinked up at him now, wide and clear, too surprised to be sad. She hadn’t been expecting him to speak.

He had not spoken to her since that first spot of daylight, when the fight was long finished, and the race was done, and there was nothing between them but the betrayal. She had spewed her excuses at him, rambled on about plans and no choice and _Pod is just a little boy, I_ couldn’t.

Her precious Hyle was far from a child, though, and his ambitions to wed her just for her title and land were far from immature. He was still worthy enough for his life to be traded for Jaime’s, though, him and some random brat.

She had denied it was for Hyle, though. Just the boy. Only the boy. “I had to protect him,” she had whined, tears pooling in her blue eyes. “He is _innocent_ , and—”

“And I am not,” he finished for her, smiling. “A wretched Kingslayer, far less deserving to live than a child. Honor compels us to defend the innocent and destroy the wicked, after all.” He kept smiling at her as her tears fell, and her fat lips quivered. “I admire you, Brienne. You sent an ally to die at the behest of your master’s corpse, only to murder that master when the wind changed your course. Never have I seen a more _honorable_ warrior.”

Her ugly face grew uglier as it crumpled with sobs. He left so he wouldn’t have to look on her further, and that had been the end of it.

Since then, there had only been the stillest silence as they made their way through the Riverlands, traveling where Jaime didn’t care to know. He should have left as soon as they survived the Brotherhood, he knew, but something had kept him there, picking at his mind, taunting him, and now, he understood why he’d stayed. He would share it with her.

Jaime pulled at his furs, showed her the long, pretty slash kissing his shoulder. “He gave me this scar, when he knighted me. His blade was made of starmetal, far sharper than Valyrian steel could hope to be, so it cut me, despite Arthur’s intention.” In the glowing firelight, Jaime could just barely see the pale line in his skin, the cut that marked him a knight. Given an eon ago, or a mere breath. Ancient, yet newborn, all at once. If he closed his eyes, he could still feel Dawn’s sting, gently grazing him.

“I'd stayed on my knees the entire night before, reflecting,” Jaime remembered. “I was supposed to be praying, but even then I knew that was naught but hogwash. In truth, I was waiting for him to return. I was so eager to speak my vows before my hero, the best knight to ever live. So honored that he had chosen me. Ready.” _Ready for valor and glory and Arthur’s pride, but instead I was given wildfire, and a heart that Arthur would despise, even beyond the grave._

Jaime’s chest tightened. He kept on. “When Arthur came for me, my knees were raw and bloody, and I was exhausted, and everything ached. Arthur told me I should become acquainted with bleeding in the name of knighthood. Blood was everything to a knight.” _Pain. Our language is pain._ “‘The seal of our devotion,’ he said. And then, he cut me.” _And he did nothing while Starks were burned and queens were raped. And he died. And he left me._

“Arthur cared for me as much as I did him," Jaime said. "I know that. But he doomed me. He let me believe in the lie.” The smoke stung at his eyes. Jaime clenched his fist. He would never forgive her for making him face this. Never. “Lannisters lie; we are masters at it. I should have been able to see one that was staring me right in the face. All of it was nothing more than a dream—Arthur, the songs, the vows. But I ignored the signs. I believed it, because I was drunk on _honor_.” His stare met hers.

Her eyes widened, but she did not run from his gaze. Those blue depths shined with remorse, but more than that, now—fear. _Good,_ he thought, as his stomach churned, and his eyes stung. He gave her a sharp smile. “All knights bleed. But you’re no knight. You’re a fucking liar. And worse, not even a good one. Arthur managed to fool me, even in death. But you? You’re as good a liar as you are beautiful.” He laughed. “I should have known.” But he had known, hadn’t he? Known it when she evaded his questions and his gaze. Known it with each guilt-ridden slump of her shoulders, every mourning glint in the sunken stormy skies where her pure sapphires had once been. Known, always known, but he’d followed her anyway. Followed her, and still foolishly felt the pulse in his chest when the ambush happened, and he realized it was _planned_. That she had lured him.

Gods. Arthur had cut him open, cursed him, marked him, but he hadn’t _meant_ to, but _Brienne_ …

Her tears had come once again, as if they had forgotten that Jaime did not care. Fat ones, silver fell from oceans. Almost as pretty as her eyes. Far prettier than the sobs pouring from her throat.

“Ser, _please,_ ” she begged. “I’m sor—”

Jaime laughed. “Even now, you misunderstand me. You beg for forgiveness where you have no fault. It is me. It has always been me. I see honor where there is only shit, and get surprised when the stench finally rears. As I said, I should have known. It won’t happen again.”

“Jaime...”

“You needn’t worry,” he said. “I understand now. Lannisters lie, but so do sheep.” He stood and went to Honor, packed some of his things on the horse’s back.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“Readying my horse for the morrow,” he answered.

“You… you’re leaving?”

“Yes. I’m returning to protect my son. I miss him.” He turned to her, saw the bright shock in her eyes, and scowled. “Surprised to hear me admit it, wench? I grow tired of lies.”

She clutched at her cloak, frame taut and stiff. “I understand.”

“Of course you do,” he said. “What could be more _honorable_ than defending the life of an inbred bastard?”

“Ser…”

“Kingslayer,” he corrected her, and the morning came too soon.

...

She was on fire.

 _Fire,_ and they swarmed her. Shadows. A beast in the shape of a man, filed teeth riddled with her flesh, and Lady Catelyn’s rotting face, milky eyes and bleeding heart, pumping through Oathkeeper, skewered, and Ronnet Connington, laughing. _You have always been this hideous,_ he told her. _Not even your face hides it, now._

Her face. It was chewed off. Chewing, _now,_ and Biter was on her, and she would die, and she had failed, and she would not find Sansa, and a rope was at her throat, tightening, _sword or noose, choose,_ and it hurt so much, all of it, the fire, and her heart, and her face, and gods, gods, _Jaime—_

He was there. Hands found hers, golden skin lighting the darkness, and the shadows were gone. “Hush, wench,” he said, and he had never sounded so gentle. “No need to fuss.”

So she didn’t.

**…**

The dawn brought sunless clouds, cold, and the wench, kneeling at the riverbank.

He should have left. Collected his traveling water elsewhere. Forgot the water, took Honor, and rode away. But he went to her.

Her cloak was finally off her shoulders, but she hadn’t let go of it. It billowed in the stream, red ribbons flowing from its dark cloth, flows of crimson clouding in the deep blue waters. Tully colors. Tully blood.

The cloak was not the only thing soiled, painted with the proof, the guilt. Red drowned her everywhere, splattered her tunic, swamped her hair, crusted her collar, mottled her waist. She was focused on the cloak for now, though. Pushed it in the water, dunking, but the red still clung to it. Would never wash off.

Jaime’s cloak had been soiled too, eons ago, before he burned it. He had chosen the white one instead of the red, and white never hid blood, never absolved any who would sully its purity. Never coddled his stain.

Brienne was too blinded by unshed tears to notice him. Her face was crumpled, innocent eyes bright with pleading as she scrubbed the cloak, but it was unyielding, and stained, and merciless. She let out a choked breath, held the cloak close to her, eyes lost and pained, and she had never looked so young.

Jaime knelt beside her, cupped the waters between them, and grazed it on her bloodied neck. She shuddered at his touch, but did not pull away. Jaime washed her. Washed the redness of her neck, the stickiness of her hands, the dried clumps in the dull straws of her hair. Cleansed it, all of it, until it clouded away with the rest, and there was just her, now. Just Brienne of Tarth.

Brienne did not move. Just gripped the cloak, trembling, and when he caressed her hair and pulled her to his chest, she broke.

Jaime held her. He held her as her chest heaved, and she buried her tears in his heart, and her nails dug into his arms, and his cheek lay across her head. He held her as she mourned, agonized. He held her until he knew she truly understood what he had said in those baths, and that there were no men and women like them, only them. He held her until she was silent.

“I loved her,” Brienne whispered, after the quiet.

“I know,” Jaime said. He had never loved Aerys, but still, he knew.

Her breath was warm against his chest. “Are you leaving, still?”

“The road to King’s Landing is shared with yours, until a crossroads some hours away,” Jaime said. “I would travel with you, until then.”

“All right,” Brienne said. Then, eons. Silence. Birdsong and sighing waves, rustling leaves. The strange smallness of her in his arms, head on his chest, warmth one with his. Horses and sweat and the coppery scent, wavering from her.

And the smallest whisper, bloomed against his neck. “Forgive me.”

Jaime stared at the river, Lady Catelyn’s blood fading with every flow of blue. Then he unraveled from her, turned, left, and when her sobs swelled again, he did not look back.

**…**

The color should not drive him so mad.

It was a color he’d always known, half of his legacy, the twin to gold. Glory, home, armor, the blood on his sword.

On her, though, it made him want to rage, to roar. Made him want to grow a new hand and kill everyone there, because she was red, and they were allowing it.

He was quite near to snapping the monk’s neck when the man dared to dismiss him. “You are not wed,” he explained, as if it fucking mattered. “Only man and wife may share a room.”

“I slay kings,” Jaime snapped. “Not fuck wounded maidens.”

“Even so,” Meribald said, “when the moon has risen, the unwed must not dwell within these walls together.”

“Even if half of the unwed party has vowed never to take a bride?” Jaime laughed. “You and your order spew more shit than my dear Honor, and he’s been quite gaseous since he was forced to eat Riverland grass after running out of those overpriced oats from my army’s camp. You fret over nothing. Her condition has only made her slightly more hideous. I would not touch her even if she didn’t reek of blood and pus, and she is my comrade, nothing more. I will not leave.” Jaime glared at the old man, waited for the next challenge. The man said nothing, just stared back.

The anger left Jaime as quickly as it came. He sighed. “You imply it is honorable to leave,” he said, no fight in his voice, “yet honor compels me to stay.” Jaime was a Lannister. He forgot nothing. Remembered the sting in his throat as he roared _sapphires,_ and they stomped on his stump, and blood gushed, and he lay there, too exhausted to scream, and his wrist wept red, anywhere, everywhere, in and over and around him. Remembered the softness of the cloth as Brienne bandaged him. _You will not die, Ser,_ she had murmured to him, so gently he nearly wept at the lilting sounds of it. The ghost of his hand had burned, screamed, _agony,_ but she’d held his other hand, the whole one, graced his fevered skin with cool roughness. She was bigger than him everywhere, even her hands, and they were like a shield on him. There was a debt to be paid, and he would pay it now.

Septon Meribald was unmoved. “The gods’ laws reign over the honor of man,” he said, not unkindly. “She will be here when you wake.”

“Oh? And here I thought she was on death’s door.” Jaime glared at him. No response. He clenched his fist. As incompetent as these men were, Brienne would surely be dead if their Isle did not exist. And she respected them, from what he’d heard.

Jaime slumped in his chair, let out a breath. “Her squire is a child still, not fit to wed anyone just yet. He will stay with her.” A rare feat, but Jaime could admit when he was wrong. It turned out the brat was not a brat, but a sweet boy—brave, too, for all that he stuttered—who had saved Tyrion’s life at the Blackwater, and adored his Lady Ser like no other. If there was a life one could use to justify betraying the Kingslayer, Podrick Payne’s was one of them, even if his chest still tightened at the memory.

The monk nodded at Jaime’s terms. Jaime stood, moved, stepped over the threshold—

And she felt him. “Jaime.” It was the slightest whimper, pained, hushed, but he heard it, _felt_ it, a light string between them, gentle, pulling, _calling._

A turn, and Jaime was on her. In his chair, at her side, flesh and gold hands finding hers. She trembled in her sleep, blue eyes shut and darting under her eyelids. “Jaime,” she wept. “ _Jaime._ ”

Jaime grazed a thumb over her sweaty hand. “Hush, wench,” he told her, just as quietly. “No need to fuss.”

A rustle of clothes sounded behind him; Jaime jumped. The septon. _Oh._ “Ser,” the old man said, voice hard.

Jaime’s stare was unyielding. “She has called for me.”

“You must not—”

“ _She has called for me,”_ Jaime said. He did not move.

The Septon was not cowed. “As do the gods,” he said. He eyed Jaime’s cloak.

Jaime saw his cloak, too. Lannister red, silk, crimson, blending with her, _blood._ Kingslayer’s Whore, they called her. This would be no better. Worse, in fact. His right to tightened chests and repentant pleas would be drowned in the red, too, and when she awakened, it would be _him_ begging for forgiveness.

Jaime watched Brienne. At his touch, her dreams seemed to calm, her breathing slowed, life shined brighter, just a bit. She did not need to call for him, now, because he was there. There, as she had been. _You will not die, Ser._

And neither would she.

“Fuck your gods,” Jaime said, and he meant every word.

But he took off his cloak, anyway.

...

Her moon’s blood was on her when she heard news of the foundling King Regent.

“The Kingslayer came in there bold as you please,” said the barkeep, as if he’d been there himself, “and stole his sister’s place. Not that she’d had much of one, after the whole city saw her sagging teats. The Sept folk made sure of that.”

Brienne had collected the herbs for her tea from the tavernwoman, went to her room. _I’m returning to protect my son,_ he had told her, right after he’d deemed her a pretender, but not before he’d held her close, soothing, petting, his breath warming her as she mourned. Far before her sickness, and he visited her fevered dreams, holding her hand, smiling, weeping for her, begging her to return to him. Far before she healed, and he left. He said he would protect his son, and he meant it. He left, trusting her with their shared vow once more, even though she’d proven she was unworthy of it.

As Brienne lay in her rank inn bed beside Podrick, clutching her cup of tea, cramped and exhausted, she thought of Jaime, and the false boy king he claimed as his child, in his heart and aloud to her, if not to the world. She wondered if it was selfish to wish he were here, searching for Sansa, honoring their vows to Lady Catelyn, rather than the unspoken one he’d made to his family. She wondered if, one day, she would make the same decision he’d made, and choose blood over oaths. She wondered if she would ever have the opportunity to. Ever stop bleeding each full moon because someone had set a cloak about her shoulders, and stole her name, and filled her belly with life.

She wondered if she would like that.

**…**

Her moon’s blood had just ended when they found the King Regent and His Grace in the road, muddied and bloodied, with a cat in their arms.

“The pretender has taken the city,” Jaime told her, as the king stood beside him, watched her with shy open eyes as green as his father’s. “We are being hunted. I would not put you and your lot in danger, my lady.”

The pretender, the one who called himself Aegon Targaryen. He had taken Tarth as well, she’d heard. She didn’t know if her father was alive. She couldn’t think of it now.

“His Grace is my king, too,” she said, despite the twinge in the back of her neck. “We will give you both safe harbor.”

A twinkle sparked in Jaime’s tired eyes, and he looked down at the boy, smiling more gently than Brienne thought he was capable of. “What do we say to that, Your Grace?”

Tommen softly clasped his hands together, bowed his head, bashful. “Thank you,” he said, quietly, and Brienne wondered if Jaime had been this shy as a child. “Being protected by a lady knight sounds quite marvelous.”

Brienne stupidly blushed at that, thought of denying the title, but Jaime was chuckling, and the boy king was introducing her to his cat, Ser Pounce, the only royal cat who they were able to save on their flight from the Red Keep. “Ser Pounce and Ser Uncle mislike each other,” Tommen told her, sadly.

“Oh,” she said, dumbly. “Why is that?”

“They are both too grumpy to be friends,” he said. “Ser Uncle said that you are kind, and good. Are you also grumpy, perchance?”

 _Kind and good._ Brienne’s ears burned. She blinked. “Grumpy? I… I do not think I am, Your Grace.”

The boy beamed at her, and put Ser Pounce in her arms. “Then you two shall be friends then, while we have safe harbor.”

 _Safe harbor,_ Brienne thought, as she held the cat close at the king’s behest. She had promised it, as she promised so many other things.

And safe harbor they gave, until a fortnight, and the ambush, and the pretender’s men had… and Tommen…

There was no body to bury. There was nothing, save for Jaime’s silent rage, Podrick’s tears, Hyle’s averted gazes, and an irritable cat with no master.

There was a bedroll, though, one Jaime and Tommen had shared. Brienne had always slept across the way, and she would watch Jaime hold the boy close, whisper to him of Lann the Clever and Aemon the Dragonknight and Ser Arthur Dayne so that his king would dream of greatness, and wake up brighter.

Tommen was not on the bedroll now, though. Only Ser Pounce. Body outstretched over both Jaime and Tommen’s side, staring up at him, glowing green eyes almost as catlike’s as Jaime’s.

“Move,” Jaime told him.

He did not.

Jaime scoffed, bent down, went to pick the cat up. Quick as a flash, Ser Pounce slashed a claw, raked deep into Jaime’s hand, _hissed_. Jaime yelped, shock on his face. Then the blood dripped onto Tommen’s side of the bed, and for half a breath, Brienne saw it. Saw his eyes widen, waver, shine.

Then the rage.

His face was darker than Brienne had ever seen it, and he grabbed a rock, raised his arm—

“ _Jaime!”_ She clutched his arm, listened to the cat scurry to safety, watched the wildness of his green eyes.

 _“Stop,”_ she said.

Jaime glared at her, stance more mad than she had ever known, and silent, so silent. Then he wrenched his hand free, dropped the rock, and went into the forest.

Brienne did not follow right away. She cleaned his blood from Tommen’s side of the bed, grabbed her bandages and waterskin. When she found him, he was sitting on a fallen, rotten log, and he was more boneless and lacking life than he ever did when they took his hand, eyes staring into nothing. _Let them have the meat, and you go away._

No.

Brienne knelt before him, grabbed his hand. He didn’t fight her, but he didn’t look at her, either. She poured water over him, cooled him, washed the blood away. The cat had been merciless; it would scar. Something to remind him forever of this night, of what she had failed to do. _Safe harbor._ Gods, she could do nothing, not find Sansa, protect Lady Catelyn, or Father, or Renly, or little Tommen.

She could clean Jaime, though. That she could do.

Brienne patted his hand with the cloth, grazed and soothed. He was somehow limp and tense all at once at her touch, and when the linen was red, and the bandages covered him, he spoke.

“I am a hypocrite,” he said. His voice was croaked, faded, dead.

She squeezed his hand, gently. “You are not.”

“I am. I despised you for lying,” he ignored her flinch, “and yet I could not even tell Tommen the truth. What I was to him. That he was mine. I couldn’t bear the thought of him turning from me, so I let him live a lie, right up until he was...” His eyes shined, darted around. He blinked. “Until the end.”

“He would not have turned from you,” Brienne told him. “He loved you. Anyone with eyes could see that.”

Jaime laughed, and it was the saddest thing she’d ever heard. “And what of those without hands?” He shifted, but didn’t free himself from her touch. Silence. Then, “Myrcella is in Dorne, still.” His voice was soft. “I would go to her, but it would be for naught. He will come for her too, soon enough, and my presence would only provoke him further. It would be smart to wed her rather than kill her, but how could he ever marry the granddaughter of the man who murdered his supposed mother and sister?” He laughed again. “My blood is cursed, Brienne. It will not end until we are all dead, my brother, me and Cersei, and the last of our brood.”

Her heart ached at his words, the utter defeat in his frame. “You can end the cycle,” Brienne told him. “What you have done in recent years has all been for honor. It was not for nothing.”

“Was it?” He scoffed. “I left Cersei to die, twice. Once right before you came for me, and again when Rhaegar’s false son came for justice. I don’t know if she’s alive. And I don’t care. Gods help me, but I don’t. I’m no different than Tyrion, Brienne. A kinslayer. The lions eat themselves, and the cubs suffer for it.”

She swallowed through her nausea, but held him tight. “You went with me to fulfill your vows to Lady Catelyn, and you chose Tommen’s safety over his mother’s. He is your king, and an innocent, and—your son. He comes above all. With both of these choices, you were a true knight. Believe that, Jaime.”

For the longest time, Jaime said nothing. Kept his gaze locked on hers, staring, emerald eyes glowing in the moonlight, and she could not look away, did not know how to, did not know what he searched for, what he saw. Then, he smiled, so fondly it ripped a jolt through her heart, and he lifted his hand from hers, grasped her between his fingers, brought her hand to his lips, and kissed her knuckles. His beard tickled her skin, and his lips were scaled roughness and velvet, all at once. It was over before it began, and when he left her, she had never been more cold.

“Goodnight, Brienne,” he said, gently.

Breathless, Brienne stood, went back to her bedroll, waited. Watched.

Eons later, Jaime returned, lay on his side of the pallet.

Ser Pounce met him from Tommen’s side. Purred, lay, snuggled up to his master’s father. Jaime reached out a hand, brought the creature to his face, buried his nose in the orange-gold hairs that almost mirrored his own. Then, silver, falling from his eyes and wetting the fur.

**…**

The riverwater fell just after each clump of her mare’s hooves. Silver, wet, _drip._ Jaime watched them stream in droplets as he rode behind her. Usually he took the front, but Honor was quite slow today. Or perhaps he hadn’t commanded him to be fast, reach that crossroad as briskly as possible.

Perhaps he wanted to see every sad slump the wench made, as guilt took her. _Forgive me,_ she’d begged. He had denied her, had hurt her, because Lannisters paid their debts. He was not done, would never be done.

So he watched that riverwater fall down her thick neck, and the tree trunks she called legs, remembered the way the sunlight reflected off the silver. Watched.

Watched as one droplet streamed red.

Jaime’s heart plummeted into his stomach. He looked up. “Brienne,” he called. No, he’d been wrong, he’d been _cruel,_ he shouldn’t have—“Brienne!”

She did not answer. Slumped in her saddle, _slumped_ —

Then, falling.

_“Brienne!”_

Nothing sounded beyond his screams, only the sigh of snow catching her, and the wail of winter, because the Starks would haunt him for all time, and it was coming, _it was coming._

**…**

The color should not drive him mad. But it did. And Jaime knew why, now.

Blue.

She belonged in blue.

**…**

There was no dawn.

Darkness reigned now, reigned forever. The moon hid itself behind clouds, a merciless white eye watching while those below suffered, rose, and suffered again. Ice and snow lived. The fires had all died. _They_ had all died. Rose again. Died.

There was no dawn. Only cold.

Brienne and Jaime fought, though. Their twin swords fought too, burned sapphire through the frost, warming them, warming what remained of their kind, and they _fought._ She was at his right, his weakened side, and he was her shield, always. “I dreamed of this, once,” he had told her with a grin, when they’d returned from their first battle. “We’re far more clothed now, though.”

Clothed they were. Her armor was bluer than the flame she wielded, and the ice could not touch her. Tonight would be no different.

Brienne heard them before she felt them. Rattling, rustles, thick, slovenly, ancient steps. Dead.

Brienne and Jaime wielded their swords, and flew. Black blood, frozen dust, screeches, groans, death. They fought them all. Fought them all, and bled, but won.

But then, the frost came. Hazing like breath, clouding, and Jaime was gone.

“Brienne!” he called out, in the misting distance. An echo.

“Jaime!” she screamed back, and the name was flung back at her.

Then, steps. Still ancient, but not rattling, not rustles.

Ice, cracking.

Brienne’s heart skipped a beat. Frantic, she ran, searched, _screamed,_ “Jaime!”

A clashing of swords beyond the mist. Cursing, _slash_ , and Brienne waited for it, waited for that scream he’d let out when the arakh rained down—

Silence.

Settling frost.

Nothing.

“Jaime?”

He did not answer.

Brienne waded through the fallen wights, the black blood until it faded into red trails. Wounded. He was wounded, not dead. Yet with each step, the droplets grew from crimson tears to streams.

Brienne kept walking. Walked until the stream was an ocean, and her heart was numb, and she found him. Sitting against a weirwood, legs sprawled out, head leaned back.

Entrails painting the snow.

“Gods,” he laughed, through a choke. “I always get uglier, whenever I’m with you.”

Bile pushed at Brienne’s throat, and her eyes burned, but no tears fell. Stared.

“Don’t look so horrified, wench,” he said. “It’s so bloody cold, I can barely feel it. No need to worry.”

Brienne did not worry. She went to her knees, though, pulled out the stitching thread in her knapsack, held up the strings of sinew dangling from the hole in his belly. She could push them in, sew him up. Sam had done it plenty of times, before the pneumonia got him, and he’d hated blood and flesh, so surely _she_ could—

Jaime laughed, and blood spurted from him with each breath. “So intimate already?” His eyes were lit with mirth, like they were still drunk at the eve of the first battle, when the sun still existed. “But we haven’t even kissed.”

She scowled, and met his eyes, but that was a mistake. She looked away. “It is not funny,” she snapped, or perhaps it was a mere whimper—she did not know.

“It certainly is,” he said. “Here you are, fingering my guts, when you’ve yet to even touch my cock.”

Brienne’s ears burned, and in the cold, it hurt. She looked at him, sought the madness in his eyes, but there was only softness, and honesty, and sadness, and green. “You saw it, though,” he said, voice husky, ragged, mourning. “In the baths. I should have given it to you then. Then, and many times over. Filled you with my seed. With children.” His gaze deepened. “But only if you wanted to,” he said, softly. “Only if you wanted.”

Her eyes burned like wildfire, and her stomach twisted. “You… you know not what you say, Ser. The sickness speaks for you.”

“Am I sick?” Jaime asked, “Or have I finally grown weak enough to set the truth free? I am a wretch, Brienne. A liar, to the end. You wore my cloak.”

“What?”

Jaime smiled. His teeth were red. His entire mouth was red, covered in it, clumps of crimson mudding his beard. “The Quiet Isle,” he rasped. “You called for me, but your septon friend wanted me gone. So I gave you my cloak. I took you from your precious Lyle. He is dead now, is he not? I forget. I am uncertain if I wish him dead or not, because he no longer matters, because you are _mine,_ Brienne.” He coughed. “I did nothing with you, didn’t even tell you, but you are mine. And I am yours. I took you when you slept, so I could stay. I did not tell you, because I feared you would turn from me.”

The sob broke free from her then, and the tears froze on her cheek, but she bit it back before she broke. Mad. He was mad now, delirious in his last moments, and he would die, gods, he would _die._

A bloody hand found her wet face, cupped her ruined cheek. “Brienne, _hush._ It is done.” His eyes sparked, and through his weakness, there was determination. “But not for you. Never you.” He gripped the hilt of his sword, brought the Valyrian steel blade before them. It was Widow’s Wail when King Joffrey had it, but King Tommen had renamed it Ser Fang. Its blue flame flickered dully, azure embers glinting faint. Fire, dying like its master, but even still, it would not burn Brienne. Their flames could not hurt one another.

The azure rose, trembling in Jaime’s shaking arm. The blade went for her shoulder.

The tears were on her again. “Jaime…”

“Brienne of House Tarth,” he said, voice clear and dim all at once, “do you swear before the eyes of gods and men to defend those who cannot defend themselves, to protect all women and children, to obey your captains, your liege lord, and your king, to fight bravely when needed, and do such other tasks as are laid upon you, however hard or humble or dangerous they may be?”

The cool heat of the blade pooled underneath the chinks in her armor, kissing her with warmth, and Jaime was dying, and his arm would give out soon, but he was _serious,_ and no, no, _no—_

Brienne’s heart was weeping, but as she stared into those flawless emeralds, her eyes remained dry. She would not deny him, nor herself. “I do,” she vowed.

Jaime gave her the softest smile. Then he lifted the sword. “Then, in the name of the Warrior,” he said, as the sword moved to her left, “I charge you to be brave. In the name of the Father, I charge you to be just.” Right. “In... the name of the Mother... I charge you to defend the young and innocent.” The sword bobbed against her, trembling, and he let out a wavering breath. “In the name of the Maid, I charge you to… protect...” He raised both hands, flesh and the dragonglass hook that replaced his golden hand, then held Ser Fang with both of them, aimed it in the crevice of her shoulder plate. Flaming metal touched leather, then her skin, and she gasped, bled anew. A pretty, thin, perfect slash, she could feel it. Eons away, a mere breath, _here,_ was her twin, resting on Jaime’s shoulder, sliced into him, as old as hers was new. Marked for life. _You are mine,_ he had said.

“All women,” Jaime finished, mischief in his dying eyes. “Do you accept these charges, Lady Brienne?”

“Yes,” she whispered.

The sword raised again, blue glow fading, fires sighing. “Then I dub thee,” he declared, “a knight of the Seven Kingdoms.” And the sword clattered to the ice, rang like a roar, a cry, then, a whimper. Its blue light was just embers, now, and Jaime had slumped further against the weirwood, _slumped…_

She could not look at him. Would not. So she reached for the sword, grabbed it, fiddled with it. Their swords were twins, one, had been whole, once. Perhaps if she touched her flame with his, it would reignite, and Jaime would—

The sword was held close between them, pressed into her chest by his arm.

Brienne blinked, looked up, faced gentle green eyes, lost in the depths of them, forests, jade, emeralds, _gods,_ and he was on her, and—

Copper was on her mouth. Copper, and red, and his lips were scales and velvet, all at once.

Brienne gasped, and he entered her, tongue brushing against hers, and she was bleeding, and he was bleeding, too, and they mixed, and merged, and it was her life with his, his blood, _Jaime,_ and his fingers caressed her hair as if she were beautiful, and she _didn’t understand,_ but her breath, and her _heart,_ and—

Jaime pulled away. A thick string of blood drew from their mouths, tethering them. Jaime gave a weak, fond laugh, broke the connection with his hand, slurped at his palm. “Would that I was tasting another sort of blood from you, wench. You’ve no idea what wickedness my tongue is capable of.” He laughed again when he saw her blush, but his bloody mouth soon tightened with bitterness. “But there was no marriage bed between us, only a sick one. Gods, I am a fool.”

Before she could respond, tell him it was the wound making him say such things, and there was never a cloak, because there _couldn’t_ be, and how could he, why would he, _why—_ he was taking his cloak off. The Lannister one, stark red in the sea of white and black and blues around them. Pulled it off his shoulders, set it on hers. It was warmer than her furs could ever be. Ever.

His eyes grew fond as he watched her, _smiled,_ smiled so soft, and gods, he was beautiful. He held her chin in the softest grasp, grazed his thumb over her skin. “I mislike you in red,” he murmured, “and yet…” He sighed, long and deep, fluttered his eyes, fell.

Brienne caught him, held him close, arms around him, palms in his curls. She wrapped his cloak around them both, sheltered them, and it was warm underneath, but he was growing colder, and it was too much. She shivered as the whimper left her, the hitched breaths, the drowning tears.

The faintest touch grazed the opening in her gauntlet. “Don’t cry, Brienne,” he said, so softly it may as well have been the wind, and that only made her cry harder. She did not let go of him though, kept her fingers running through his hair, calming him as she broke.

He was fading. She had to muster the courage now. Had to tell him.

“I would not have turned from you,” she said, choking.

“Hmm?”

“You needn’t have feared telling me about the cloak. I would not have turned from you.” Silence took her tongue. A coward, even to the end. Damn her.

The breathiest, weakest chuckle. “Anyone with eyes could see that, yes?” he asked, and she was too afraid to answer. Trembling arms rose, found her neck, used his remaining strength to pull himself upward, bury his face there. He hummed softly, and he had never sounded so content. “You are just as gentle with me now as you were in Harrenhal, do you remember, sweetling?” His softening voice vibrated against her skin. “...I should have wed you then...ser...my knight. My wife…” The last breath was both fire and ice on her flesh, all at once. He grew still.

The cry flew from her throat before she knew it. Or perhaps it was a scream. Or perhaps it wasn’t a scream at all, and she was dead, too, dead like all of them, like Jaime, and Father, and Pod, and Sansa, and Arya, Jon Snow, Queen Daenerys, Sandor Clegane, Hyle Hunt, all of them, _all of them,_ and the world was a wasteland, and _she was alone_ , and _Jaime—_

Gods, it hurt. It all hurt so much.

 _Go away inside,_ he had told her eons ago, before he decided he would not let her be raped. _Think of Tarth, its mountains and waterfalls, its songbirds and trees,_ but Tarth was dead now, too, crumbled by the false Targaryen and hazed in frost by the Others, and there was no home, no honor, no Jaime, nothing, nothing.

There was the child, though. Sansa and Sandor’s. And Ser Pounce, little Tommen’s cat. The creature was a better survivor than her, than all of them. He did not need her, but she needed him, needed to nuzzle in his fur as the cold settled in, and there was naught between her and the babe but Oathkeeper and their warmth.

But still. Still.

_Still._

The wind had grown still.

The wind had grown still, and the mist had returned. Footsteps. Crackling. _Ice._

Brienne cradled Jaime as the Others watched them. Cradled him close, as the winter hazed. As the dark grew darker.

Brienne watched them, too. Beautiful and terrible, the same blue her armor was before Jaime’s blood, and they were glowing, staring, hating. Wanting to reach the child. To raise Jaime, make him their soldier. But Ser Jaime’s fight was done, and the babe’s, never.

Hers was eternal, though. _All knights bleed._

Brienne gently lay Jaime down, set their cloak over his open belly, placed Ser Fang over him, wrapped his hand and hook around the hilt. Ran one last stroke through his golden curls. Soft, even in death. She wondered what that was like. She wondered if she would know, soon.

The Others swarmed, slowly, swelling like winter. Dry-eyed, Brienne of Tarth stood, and unsheathed Oathkeeper. Its flame burst through the frosted air, glowing, burning brighter than it ever had, and the Others were cold, colder than the heart of winter, but Jaime’s blood was on her, and in her, and she had never been so warm, never been so bright. _Never been so bright,_ and in her mind, her heart, she heard it.

_Come on, come on, my sweetling, the music's still playing._

She took a step forward. One. Another. They followed. The ice in their steps was drums, the blow of the wind strumming harps.

_Might I have this dance, my lady?_

Ser Brienne nodded, and brandished her sword as the ghosts came rushing in.

**…**

Those astonishing eyes were still closed, the blue shut away from him, hiding. Only red bathed her, and she was as ugly as she had always been, but her skin had cooled, and her breath less ragged, and her blood had stopped flowing from the hole in her belly, had fueled the life within her. Ladies of Lannister always fought until they could fight no more, especially when they were not Lannisters, and Brienne of Tarth’s battle would never be done.

“He has to know he never deserved you,” Jaime said, lips brushing against her sweet, brutish hand. “Your beloved Lyle. He knows you are a far more honorable knight than he had ever dreamed. He knows you are the hero he’s been seeking all his life, but never found. He knows you are his blue knight, the songs made flesh. He knows you are far too beautiful for him. But you must tell him. You must show him through living. _Live,_ Brienne.”


End file.
